Monthly Archives: August 2015

“Increasing human dominance of tropical forests” co-authored by Dr Edwards has just been published in Science. Four chronological phases of human influences on tropical forests are discussed: phase I, hunting and megafauna extinctions; phase II, low-intensity shifting cultivation; and phase III, global integration in which economics drives land-use and climate change.

Finally, the very dreaded phase IV may take place in the near future, so-called “global simplification” by which intensive logging and rapid climatic changes would cause worldwide loss of species. The future lies in the hands of humankind…